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COPYRIGHT DEPOSff. 



COSMOS 

By ERNEST McGAFFEY 



The Philosopher Press 
Wausau Wisconsin 



LIBRARY of CONGRESS 
Two Copies Received 

DEC 26 1903 

Copyiight Entty 

CLASS Q- X'xc. No. 

/ COPY^S t 






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Copyrighted 1903 
By ERNEST McGAFFEY 



DEDICATED TO 

CARTER H. HARRISON 

OF CHICAGO 



COSMOS 



ONE 

I 
Go search the aeons an you will 
Where withered leaves of Doubt are whirled, 
And who hath solved this riddle, Life, 
Or Death — that moves with sails unfurled, 
Beyond the straining eyes of man 
Marooned upon an unknown world. 

11 
Nor tongue hath told, nor vision caught 
That paradox. Primeval Cause; 
Each age has had some parable 
Each age succeeding marked the flaws; 
While shifted, with the calendar. 
What men have termed generic laws. 

in 
Creed after creed behold them now 
Like Etna on Vesuvius piled; 
Till, scaled to earth by drifting sands 
They lie in later days reviled. 
And pushed aside by Time's rough hand 
As toys are, by a peevish child. 



IV 

For Priest-made dodrine reads grotesque. 
And earthly worship is but dross; 
Whether it be your Brahm of Ind 
Or squat and hideous Chinese Joss; 
Or Jove, aloft on cloud-capped throne 
Or the pale Christ upon his cross. 

V 

Why que^ion ^ill the blindfold graves 

Or pluck the veil of Isis dread? 

Over Death's icy my^ery 

A pall immutable is spread; 

And never tear-wrung agony 

Shall move the lips we loved — once dead. 

VI 

Why grope in labyrinthian mcize? 
Why palter thus with doubt and fear? 
The Pa^ is but the mollusc print 
The Future looms, a barrier sheer; 
The Present centers in To-day 
The hope for men is Now, and Here. 

VII 

Believe no scientific cant 
That man descended from the ape; 
Gorilla-like once beat his brea^ 
And grew at la^ to human shape, 
To watch the flocks, and till the fields, 
Harry the seas and bruise the grape. 



For though enrobed in savage skins 
And though his forehead backward ran, 
The brute was not all-dominant 
Some spark revealed a Primal plan; 
His brain was coupled with his will 
The hairy mammal ^ill was man. 

IX 

And ever as the cycles waned 
He came and went, he rose and fell, 
At times transformed, as butterflies 
That rise from chrysalis in the cell; 
And oft through hate and ignorance 
Sunk downward deep as fabled Hell. 

X 

But through it all, and with it all 
How-e'er the upward trending veers. 
He fought his fight again^ great odds 
He peopled ice-bound hemispheres. 
Endured the sweltering Torrid Zones 
And damped his impress on the years. 



TWO 

I 
What romance ha^ thy childhood known 
Of God-made world in seven days? 
Of woven sands and swaying grass 
And bird and beast in forest ways, 
Of panoramas vast unrolled 
Before a stem Creator's gaze? 

n 
Of rivers ribboning the vales; 
Of plains that stretched in smoothness down, 
And unborn seasons yet to be 
Spring's violet banks, and Autumn's brown; 
Bright Summer, mistress of the sun. 
And grey-beard Winter's boreal crown. 

ni 
And when at length the scheme complete 
Unfolded to the Maker's sight. 
How He, Almighty and divine 
Said in his power, "Let there be light!" 
Gave sun and moon, and sowed the stars 
Along the furrows of the night! 



IV 

Lo! every nation has its tale 
And every people, how they be; 
Whether where Southern zephyrs loose 
The blooms from off the tamarind tree, 
Or where the six-month seasons bide 
Around the cloi^ered Polar sea. 

v 
And Science with unyielding scales 
Weighs each and all of varied ^yles; 
And like a Goddess molds decrees 
Oblivious both to tears or smiles; 
Points out the error, reads the rule 
And God with Nature reconciles. 

VI 

But who shall sift the false and true? 

What Oracle the rule enforce? 

Not man-made creed, nor man-learned law 

Is wise to fathom Nature's course; 

No sea is deeper than its bed 

No ^ream is higher than its source. 

VII 

Vain hope to solve the Infinite! 
Mere words to babble, when they say 
"Thus Science teaches," — "thus our God"- 
Thus this or that — what of it, pray? 
The marvel overlapping all — 
Go ask the Sphynx of Ye^erday. 



vra 
We know the All, and nothing know; 
The great we ken as well as lea^; 
But sum it all when we have said 
That man is different from the bea^; 
And spite of all Theology 
The Pagan's equal to the Prie^. 

IX 

And globes will lapse, and suns expire; 
As ^ars have fallen, worlds can change; 
Forever shall the centuries roll 
And roving planets tireless range; 
And Life be masked in secrecy 
With Death, as ever, passing Grange. 

X 

And trow not. Mortal, in thy pride 
That where yon beetling column ^ands 
Rests Permanence; 'twill disappear 
To sink in marsh or barren lands. 
Where bitterns boom, or sunlight ^ares 
Across the immemorial sands. 



THREE 
I 

Of old when man to being came 
He fashioned Gods of brittle bone; 
Bowed down to wooden fetiches 
Or worshipped idols carved from stone; 
And, locked in Super^ition's grasp 
For sacrifice made lives atone. 

II 
And Fear was then the Higher Law 
And fleshly joys the aftermath; 
He knew no screed of Righteousness 
And trod no ^raight and narrow path; 
His Deity a terror was 
A Demon winged with might and wrath. 

Ill 
And then where- Nilus dipped his feet 
By Egypt sands, rose temples tall 
To Isis and Osiris — Ptah — 
And many a God foredoomed to fall; 
Where sank the shades of Pharaoh's reign? 
Whence have they vanished, one and all? 



IV 

But whiles to other years advanced 

And now by cosmic marvels won, 

Men sought remote Pelagian shores 

Where breeze and spray their tape^ry spun, 

To wait the coming of the day 

And there adore the rising sun. 

V 

This passed; the Gods of Greece and Rome 
In splendor thronged the earth and skies; 
Jove, with the thunders in his hand 
Apollo of the ^ar-lit eyes, 
Aurora, Prie^ess of the Dawn 
And Pan of haunting melodies, — 

VI 

And countless more; their temples fair 
Where reverent Pagans curved the knee, 
Mid sweet, perpetual summer ^ood 
While murmured as the murmuring bee, 
The lulling sweep of li^less brine 
Beside the green ^gean sea. 

VII 

And merged in island-wooded calms 
By towering groves of ancient oak. 
Where Triton's charging cavalry 
Again^ the cliffs of Britain broke. 
With horrid rite of human blood 
The Celtic Druids moved and spoke. 



vra 
Still wheeled the cycles; ^ill did men 
With new religions make them wise; 
Mahomet rose magnificent 
As rainbow in the ea^em skies; 
With Seven Heavens of Koran taught 
And Houris with the sloe-black eyes. 

IX 

Brahm, Baal, Dagon, Moloch, Thor, 
And legions more had long sufficed; 
Heavens in turn with bliss diverse 
And Hells with ebon glaciers iced; 
And late^ on cele^ial scrolls 
The prophets wrote the name of Christ. 

X 

We need them not; No! each and all 

Will load Tradition's dusty shelf; 

As shattered Idols, put away 

To lie forgot like broken delf; 

Humanity is over all! 

And Man's redemption in himself. 



FOUR 

I 
The morning stars together sang 
So runs the story, in that time, 
When groves were loud with melody 
And ripples danced to liquid rhyme; 
Far in the embryonic spheres 
Before the earth was in her prime. 

II 
Then first the feline-padded gales 
Unleashed and prowling journeyed free, 
To purr amid the cowering grass 
Or roar in stormy jubilee. 
Or, joining in with Ocean, growl 
A hoarse duet of wind and sea. 

m 
And where by meadowy rushes dank 
The yellow sunbeams thick were sown. 
And brooks flowed down through April ways 
O'er pebbled bar and shingly stone. 
There first welled up in gurgling strain 
The lisping current's monotone. 

10 



IV 

And oft was heard, in forest aisles 

Where rocking trees of leaves were thinned, 

And drear November wandered lorn 

With wild wide eyes and hair unpinned, 

A wailing harp of minor chords 

Struck by the strong hands of the wind. 

V 

And Man, through imitative art, 
With clumsy tool and method crude. 
Copied these echoes as he might 
To soothe him in his solitude; 
And when that other sound was dumb 
His reed-notes quavered music rude. 

VI 

And as the gentler graces came 
To vivify barbaric night. 
So Poesy, with singing Lyre, 
Descended from Parnassian height, 
With constellations aureoled 
Her raiment wove of flowing light. 

VII 

And in Man's heart a thrill leaped up; 
His eye was lit by prophet gleams; 
He sought the truth of When and How 
He voiced the lyrics of the streams; 
His beard was tossed, his locks were gray 
His soul beneath the spell of dreams. 

u 



VIII 

Thus numbers came; and Poets lived 
To chant the glories of the Race; 
Their rhyme on limp papyrus roll 
Or etched on crumbling pillar's base, 
Has long outlived the Kings they sung 
And conquered even Time and Space. 

IX 

Aye! vain the vaunt of Heroes; vain 

The deeds that once were thought sublime; 

And vain your Monarchs, briefly staged 

In tinselled royal pantomime; 

Their House was builded on the sands 

And they unworth a random rhyme. 

X 

Vain are the works of man; most vain 
His bubbled Glory, Aye! or Fame; 
More fragile than a last-year's leaf 
Unnoticed of the sunset's flame; 
And naught endures unless it stands 
Linked with a deathless Poet's name. 



12 



FIVE 

I 
How flourished then the lesser arts 
As man to manhood slowly grew? 
With blackened ^ick from ruddy fires 
That on his cave refledtions threw, 
He scrawled the rock which sheltered him 
And thus the fir^ rude pidure drew. 

II 
And catching hints from Nature's lore 
He squeezed his colors from the clay; 
Steeped leaf and bark, and dyed the skins 
That round about his dwelling lay; 
And, urged by vanity, his cheeks 
Were daubed with dash of pigments gay. 

Ill 
So, ever as the seasons died 
His mind expanded with his will; 
He saw the dry leaves touched with gold 
And grass grow tawny on the hill; 
Found etchings on the ruffled breams 
And marked the sunset's hedic thrill. 

13 



IV 

And dreaming thus, with defter skill 
He fa^ employed his nights and days, 
Spun magic webs of chequered lights 
And limned Odober's purple haze; 
While women's faces from his brush 
Fired, like wine, the se*er's gaze. 

V 

Until at la^ was handed down 
Beyond the treasure-trove of Greece, 
Beyond the ^rain that Sappho sung 
And reveries of the Golden Fleece, 
The art of Titian, Rubens, Thai, 
And Tintoretto's ma^erpiece. 

VI 

Thus, too, as man with curious eye 
Had noted outline, curve, and form. 
In toppling surge or lofty crag 
In woman's bosom beating warm. 
In cloudy shapes revealed on high 
Intaglios of the wind and ^orm, — 

VII 

He modelled from the pla^ic loam; 
On shell and boulder graved a sign; 
Chiselled the lately obelisks 
With hieroglyphics, line on line; 
Colossal wrought his haughty Kings 
Or metal-traced the clambering vine. 

14 



vm 
And many an image was his work 
And many a ^atuette and bu^; 
Some that remain, but mo^ that lie 
As shards to outer darkness thru^; 
These buried under coral sands 
Those cloaked beneath forgotten du^. 

DC 

Upon the lonely wa^es that Wretch 

Where the Egyptian rivers croon, 

And floats above the Pyramids 

On tropic nights the lifeless moon, 

The mightier waits, — the brooding Sphynx- 

Half-lion and half Daemon hewn. 

X 

So Sculpture, pierced in mountain sides 
Or dragged from Mythologic seas. 
Still holds a sway; and worlds will bow 
In homage yet to such as these — 
The noble bronze by Phidias wrought, 
The marbles of Praxiteles. 



15 



SIX 

I 
To those who for their country bleed 
To those who die for freedom's sake, 
All Hail! for them the Immortal dawns 
In waves of lilied silver break; 
For them in dusky-templed night 
The eternal ^ars a halo make. 

II 
In Hi^ory's tome their chronicle 
An ever-living page shall be; 
The souls who flashed like sabers drawn 
The men who died to make men free; 
Their flag in every land has flown 
Their sails have whitened every sea. 

Ill 
On gallows high they met their doom 
Or breamed ^raight the serried spears 
Of Tyranny; in dungeons damp 
Scarred on the ^ones their name appears; 
For them the flower of Memory 
Shall blossom, watered by our tears. 

16 



IV 

But Conquer, Glory, transient Fame, 
What baubles these to druggie for, 
When draped in sulphurous films uprise 
The cannon-throated fiends of War! 
What childish trumpery cheap as this — 
The trophies of a Conqueror? 

V 

How many an army marches forth 
With bugle-note or battle-hymn, 
To drench the soil in human gore 
And multiply Golgothas grim; 
And all for what? a Ruler's pique 
Religion's call, or Harlot's whim. 

VI 

And gha^lie^ far among them all 
Where torn and Gained the thirty sod 
With carnage reeks — where ^andards fly, 
And horses gallop, iron-shod, 
Are those remorseless mockeries 
The wars they wage in name of God. 

VII 

Vague, dim and vague, and noiselessly. 
The Warrior's triumphs fade like haze; 
And building winds have heaped the sands 
O'er monuments of martial days; 
While Legend throws a flickering gleam 
Where the tall Trojan towers blaze. 

17 



vm 
Yea! whether sought for Woman's face 
Or, Conque^-seeking, seaward poured, 
Or at the beck of Holy Church 
War ^ill shall be the thing abhorred; 
And they who by the sword would live 
Shall surely perish by the sword. 

IX 

Yet whether at Thermopylae 
Where battled the intrepid Greek, 
Or Waterloo— their quarry ^ill 
The red-eyed ravening vultures seek; 
Where prowl the jackal and the fox 
And the swart raven whets his beak. 

X 

And somewhere, though by Alien seas 
The tide of Hate unceasing frets; 
For dawn to dusk, and dusk to dawn 
The red sun rises, no, nor sets. 
Save where the wraith of War is seen 
Above her glittering bayonets. 



18 



SEVEN 

I 
How fared the body when the soul 
In olden days had taken flight? 
Had passed as through a shutter slips 
A trembling shaft of summer light! 
And all that once was Life's warm glow 
Had sudden changed to dreadful night! 

II 
How fared the mourners; how the Prie^; 
How spoken his funereal theme? 
What dirges for the Heroic dead 
What flowers to soften death's extreme? 
Was Life to them a wayside Inn 
Death the beginning of a dream? 

Ill 
We cannot know; except by tales 
Caught in the traveller's flying loom, 
Or carven granite friezes found 
Or parchment penned in convent gloom; 
Or here and there, defying Time 
Some long-dead Emperor's giant tomb. 

19 



IV 

Where tower the ^eep Egyptian cones 
By couriers of the ^orm bedrid, 
Wrapped in his blackening cerements 
Sahura lies in shadow hid, 
While billowy sand-curves rise and dash 
Like surf, again^ his Pyramid. 

V 

And on the bald Norweyan shores 
When Odin for the Viking came, 
A ship was launched, and on it placed 
With solemn ^ate, the Hero's frame; 
The torch applied, and sent to sea, 
A double burial, — wave and flame. 

VI 

And when the Hindu Prince lay prone- 
In final consecration dire 
His Hindu Princess followed on 
And climbed the blazing funeral pyre, 
To ^and in living sacrifice 
Transfigured in her robes of fire. 

VII 

Where the red Indian of the Plains 
To the Great Spirit bowed his head, 
On pole-built scaffold. Eagle-plumed, 
The painted warrior laid his dead; 
Beneath, the favorite charger slain 
And by the Chief his weapons spread. 

20 



We clothe our dead in modish dress 
Du^ unto du^ the Preacher saith, 
The church-bells toll, the organ peals, 
And mourners wait with ebbing breath; 
Oh! grave, this is thy mockery. 
The weird farce-comedy of Death. 

IX 

Nay! bum the shell with simple^ rites; 

Scatter its ashes to the skies; 

And on the fairways of the clouds 

In winding spirals let it rise; 

What needs the soul of mortal garb 

Whether in Hell or Paradise? 

X 

Aye! lost and gone; what cares the corse 
When Death unfolds his sable wings, 
Whether it re^ in wind-swept tree 
Or where the deep-sea echo rings? 
Be laid to sleep in Potter's Field 
Or lone lona's cairn of Kings? 



21 



EIGHT 

I 

Above unsightly city roofs 
Where smoky serpents trail the sky, 
Broods Commerce; in her fadories 
A million clacking shuttles fly; 
Where, choked with lint, in sickly air 
The little children droop and die. 

II 
The rattling clash of jarring wheels 
Against the windows echoing beats; 
And when the pallid gas-jets flare 
Where sombre night with twilight meets, 
Like flotsam on the stream of Fate 
The toiler's myriads crowd the streets. 

Ill 
With hiving tumult to and fro 
Trade's devotees, a hurrying mass. 
Through the long corridor of years 
In due procession rise and pass; 
To earn their wage, to seek their goal 
And melt, like dew-drops on the grass. 

22 

.LofC. 



IV 

And here, within the age of Gain 
Our fore^-ma^ed harbors shine 
With shimmering fleets; and we go on 
To climes afar of palm and vine, 
And in the warp of Traffic weave 
A sini^er and base design, 

v 
Of mild and hapless Islanders 
Who fall before our soldiers' aim; 
Of broken faith — of sophi^ries — 
Of sin, of blood-shed, and of shame; 
Oh! Commerce, Commerce, who shall tell 
The crimes committed in thy name. 

VI 

Turn, turn my Fancy, inland borne 
Where Nature's solace shall not fail 
To ease the heart; view skyey seas 
Where cloud armadas, sail on sail, 
Manned by the winds go warping down 
Below the far horizon's trail. 

VII 

And as the budding willows blow 

When March comes whirling pa^ the lanes, 

With bird-note wild, and fifing winds 

And undertone of sibilant rains. 

On slopes where Winter's garment melts 

Blue as the sea are violet ^ains. 

23 



vm 
Where cattle seek the shaded pools 
And silence folds the sun-burned lands, 
Her auburn tresses backward flung 
Mid-Summer, like to Ceres stands. 
Beside the fields of waving grain 
With harvest-apples in her hands. 

IX 

And stealthily through winnowing dusk 
I see the curling smoke ascend, 
Where lie the farms; and evermore 
Where hope, and health, and manhood blend; 
While stubble shorn and pastures bare 
Proclaim the waning season's end. 

X 

And as beyond the naked hills 
The chill November sunset dies, 
And cloudward now a phalanx swims 
Where guttural honking fills the skies, 
Black-sculptured on approaching night 
And southward bound, the wild-goose flies. 



24 



NINE 

I 
Behold the kindred human types 
Tribe, Sept, and class. Race, Ca^e, and Clan; 
Red, Black and Yellow; White and Brown; 
Processions of Primordial Man 
That wax apace, and ^ream across 
In one unending caravan. 

n 
The Fisher-People with their shells 
And dwellers of the Age of Stone; 
The Kirghiz of the We^em Steppes 
The Greek, the Turk, the Mongol shown, 
The Goth, the Frank, — I see them pass 
Like flash-lights by a mirror thrown. 

m 
So, too, the Arab, bumoose clad 
Who braves the rifling Simoon dry, 
Adrift upon Saharan tides 
His awkward camels lurching high. 
Long, lank, uncouth, but launch as Death, 
Ships of the Desert, sailing by. 

25 



IV 

Note the Caucasian in his pride 
Who prates of moldy pedigrees; 
A mushroom he, compared in Eld 
To the impassive, sly Chinese; 
Their records co-extant with Time 
And swarming by the sundown seas. 

V 

Each comes and goes; as came and went 
Rameses* millions; in their day 
What boa^ was made of Egypt's Kings 
How God-like seemed their valorous play; 
But cynic years dispersed their line 
Swift hurried with the winds away. 

VI 

Aye! even as motes they had their grace 
For a brief moment, son and sire; 
Then passed; as foam that sinks at sea 
Or chords which flee the Min^rel's lyre; 
Where rot the walls by Sidon raised? 
And where the long-lo^ hulls of Tyre? 

VII 

And all men li^en in their turn 

To the same Sirens; greed of Gain — 

Love— Hate— Revenge— the lu^ of Power- 

And craze o*er fellow-man to reign — 

Ambition's lure — these intertwine 

Like links that form an endless chain. 

26 



VIII 

Since Power is but the infant's clutch 
And naught so trivial as a Name, 
What crucial proof shall fix men's worth 
On lasting tablets write their claim; 
So that their memories may fill 
A niche within the walls of Fame? 

IX 

The te^ is not of Birth nor Race 
Since each is worthy of his hire; 
It re^s in what men do for men 
Uplifted by the soul's desire, 
To tread Life's fiery furnaces 
And save their brothers from the fire. 

X 

And ranging far and searching deep 
However though the annals be, 
We find but one nigh faultless man 
There was none other such as He; 
The Jew who taught and practiced Love 
The man who walked by Galilee. 



27 



TEN 

I 
Enough my Muse; thy message ca^ 
As ^one from out a sling is hurled, 
Let drop to night; or re-appear 
Where morning's gathering grey is pearled, 
And the bent sun, like Sisyphus, 
Toils laboring up the underworld. 

II 
Let be; thy wisdom knoweth well 
The ju^ degrees of right and wrong; 
Although mayhap unmarked by men 
Shall fall the echoes of thy song; 
Unheeded by the pilgrim years 
Unrecked of, by the heedless throng. 

Ill 
And yet before the highways part 
And thou and I in darkness dwell. 
Do thou thy swifted Herald send 
And this as final warning tell; 
' Banish all hope of gilded Heaven 
And laugh to scorn the fires of Hell ' . 

28 



IV 

Phantasmal dance those dual sprites 

Mere witch-craft mummeries of the brain; 

The lying sorcery of the Prices 

A worldly influence to retain; 

Where shalt thou go? What que^ is thine? 

Where falls the single drop of rain? 

V 

But Courage, Faith, and Con^ancy, 
The cardinal virtues as I deem. 
May well be worshipped, as indeed 
The lilies of the soul they seem; 
Undying in their fragrance rare 
And glassed upon a sacred ^ream. 

VI 

Know thou, the Ideal Harmony 
That fills all space, below, above. 
Is not in Creed, nor Form, nor Rite 
Nor in those things thou dreamed of; 
But holds within its breadth and scope 
The sole and only note of Love. 

vn 
Rejed all Creeds; and yet in each 
Seek such material as thou can, 
With here a tenet, there a thought 
Whether it sprang from Chri^ or Pan; 
And make the key-^one of thy arch 
The common brotherhood of Man. 

29 



vm ^ 
And driving thus, a happier creed 
In time to come shall bur^ its bud, 
The pure air cleared of battle-smoke 
And war no more by field and flood; 
Where men can lift up guiltless hands 
Uncrimsoned by a brother's blood. 

IX 

When nevermore in calm or ^orm 
Shall hawk-like hover on the seas. 
The canvas of opposing ships 
Their pennants floating to the breeze; 
And golden hopes will supersede 
The apples of Hesperides. 

X 

When man-emancipated man 
Through loftier purpose wins control; 
With Ju^ice as his only God 
To reign supreme o'er heart and soul; 
And Love, sun-like, illuminates 
The one, the true, the perfed whole. 



30 



NOTES TO COSMOS 



Notes to Cosmos 

Certain Lanzas once intended for the 
original are here given. They are set down 
according to the chapters in which they were 
to have appeared. 

Chapter Two 

Of trees that birred in early Spring 
The slow sap moving in their veins; 
Of flowers that dyed the woodland slopes 
The primrose pale, and daisy-chains; 
Sun-kissed betimes, or overmoumed 
By shimmery tears of sobbing rains. 

Chapter Four 

And all night long the re^less sea 
Agai^ its barriers rose and fell. 
Till grey-eyed Dawn, by lonely sands 
Saw flash and fade the la^ broad swell, 
Before her there the ebb-tide*s gleam 
And at her feet a murmuring shell. 



And then were heard the Elder Bards 
In full, Prophetic tone sublime, 
Their eyes ablaze with ec^acy 
And on their lips the living rhyme; 
King-honored in an age of Kings 
And on their beards the fro^s of Time. 

Chapter Eight 

And when a-down the bare brown lanes 
Pattered the swift, white feet of Spring, 
I saw the velvet-golden flash 
That marked the yellow-hammer's wing 
A-curve on high; and later heard 
The robin, and the blue-bird sing. 

Far seaward on unnumbered isles 
Mid scent of spice and drowsy balm, 
The lotos-eating Islanders 
Lay soothed to sleep by utter calm; 
Low at their feet the pulsing tides 
And o'er their heads the tufted palm. 

Chapter Nine 

Stark warriors of the Age of Stone 
With pri^ine valor all elate. 
Who sought and slew the great Cave Bear 
And robbed the tigress of her mate; 
And, weaponed with the ax and spear, 
Defied the towering mammoth's hate. 



And slant-eyed Mongols, yellow-skinned, 
Who traversed We^em Steppes afar. 
Drank mare's milk, and observed their flocks 
White-clu^ered 'neath the Morning Star; 
Or, sallying forth with lance and bow 
Engaged in fierce Nomadic war. 

On vine-clad hills was found the Gaul; 
Above him gli^ened Alpine snows: 
And lower down where valleys lay 
Loved of the lily and the rose, 
By moon-light tranced, the nightingale 
Sang silvery-sweet adagios. 



DEC 26 1903 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
015 762 723 5 # 




